Suzuki Music Academy of Hong Kong

"Music Exists for the purpose of growing an admirable heart" ~Shinichi Suzuki

Reflections from the Performers: Viola! Book 2 ~ Yeh Joon, Linnaea and Aslan

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Linnaea, Aslan and Yeh Joon worked together to prepare their Book 2 recital, starting from the beginning of the Fall Term. All of their efforts culminated in their performance on Saturday. Here are the performers’ reflections on the experience:

from Aslan

Over the course of the past few months i have been preparing for my book 2 recital and thought it went better than i thought as i didn’t mess up as much as i thought i would, I put a lot of effort into bochorreni minute as i couldn’t get the slurs to be fast enough or long enough and in the recital i executed it quite well. With the help of Linnea and Yeah Joon we got to play chorus from Judas maccabaeus in harmony which in my opinion sounded quite nice plus we also got to play musette as a harmony too. My three solo pieces are quite nice as i didn’t mess up as much as i did before and i remembered the trigger notes of D,D,B,B in Bourree. In the two grenadiers i thought i had great dynamics and showed the different moods of the piece. Although in witches dance i messed up a bit but i still kept on beat and continued playing the song. Twinkles were great. 🙂

from Yeh Joon

In this book2 recital, I felt more nervous than book 1 recital because they are harder pieces. One thing I enjoyed the most about this book recital was how we as a group collaborated well with one another. In my Gavotte from Mignon, I rushed the piece and my best piece was Long Long Ago. I learned that I should prepare more to make me feel better when preforming. Will remember this for next time.  

from Linnaea

Reflections from the Performers: COSETTE & SOPHIE

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Cosette and Sophie performed their very first viola recital, giving their Book 1 recital on Saturday, 6 March. They each had family members attend in person, and there was a large audience of family and friends on zoom as well! Here are their thoughts about the experience.

Cosette

from Cosette

I felt nervous at first, but after awhile, I felt the nervousness go away and soon I was playing confidently. I think that it was great! I’m grateful to the Pandemic that I can focus and practise more. I start to enjoy learning the viola more and more.

Thank you Miss Monica, Miss Yuko, Miss Diane and Miss Marla for teaching me. It was a great journey that you all walked with me.

Sophie

from Sophie

I liked the recital. I think it was rather good because I practiced. And because it sounded good and I liked the songs. I felt good performing. At first I was a bit nervous, but during the performance I thought it was nothing to worry about.

Reflections from the Performers: SANDER & STEPHEN

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Sander and Stephen gave their Book 3 recital on Saturday, 6 March, 2021. They each had one parent and their private teacher as part of the live audience, as well as family and friends joining on Zoom. Here are their thoughts about the experience:

from Sander

Recently I shared a book recital with Stephen. It was a fun and enjoyable experience playing at the recital and practicing/preparing for it. I learned one important piece of information about practicing for a performance in the process, and that is the importance of perfecting the beginning as everything stems off of it, so if you have a solid and confident beginning the piece will sound great.

from Stephen

Before the recital started I felt really nervous but when it started I felt more anxious. On the first song martini govatte I felt ok because I had been practicing it. After that I felt ok with the over songs until  Bach Bouree before I even played that song my hands started to sweat because when  I practiced Bach bouree it was the hardest song to practice. After Bach Bouree I felt ok again and after the recital finished I felt Happy. I loved playing the pieces that either Sanders would play the harmony and I play the melody or Sander would play the melody and I play the harmony, because I don’t feel so nervous playing with Sander even if I feel a bit nervous when I play the hard parts in Bach minuet or Govatte in G minor. When it  was picture time I made silly faces because I love doing that when it comes to picture time.

Studio Recitals

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SMAHK was so fortunate to be able to have our studio recitals in person over the past several weeks. We all enjoyed having the opportunity to share music together in the same place! The audience was very enthusiastic, even though much smaller than usual due to distancing guidelines.

We hope you enjoy these photos as much as we all enjoyed the performances!

Reflections from the Performers: Book 2 Viola Recital ~ Ha Jin and Stephen

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~ from Ha Jin

I think my Book 2 recital overall went really well. While practicing for it, I think doing everything online is much harder. Completely matching the piano videos was very challenging as you needed to pay very close attention to the music you are hearing and the piece you are playing. However despite the confusion with making recordings, everything else went very smoothly. During the zoom, there were no technical difficulties which I was not expecting and if we ignored the small on a device and the different backgrounds, it was like playing in the studio together. My book 2 recital went much better than I had expected and I have learned a lot from this experience and the challenges that went along with it. I am really glad that we could have the recital and I think we did our best even though it was online!

~ from Stephen

My reflection was quite or very good because I thought it would be in person but   as soon as I herd the news that it would gbe on zoom I got very suprised because I would need to practice even harder because it was not on person any more it was on zoom! Before we started I was really nervouse because I thought that I hadnt practiced ebough but as soon as it started I started to feel a bit more relaxed as I started the first song hunters chorus. I even thought that we would have to play Bocherinee minuet in person because the video did not work but no we did not have to play Bochereeni minuet in person. After Hunters I started to calm down because I did great and it was my partner Ha Jin;s turn.After a duet of musete it was my turn again!I was worried that I would mess up in the middle of minuet in G because the shifting part was extremley hard to shift and play colley bows,but at the end I did finish minuet in G the diffrent way that I had thought at the start.After that was Ha Jins turn then two songs on share screen then it was my turn!!!!!!! When I started waltz it wasnt as slow as I expected it to be because when I practiced before the recital the song was way slower.But still I also did quite well at playing Waltz.After that was a video on share screen but then it was my turn and I had’nt practiced the two grenediers for a while but I found out that I did amazing at The Two grenediers after that was twinkle on share screen after that the recitle was over so it ended up quite good!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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